Placements slowing down but colleges can adapt to new normal

Abstract

Unemployment among our youth is a burning issue for India. While the ILO data on India’s employment scenario is debatable, there is another statistic that we should take note of. According to the department of economic affairs 2024 review, the employable percentage of pre-final and final year students in India stood at 51%. Given this shortfall and the huge middle-class population, it’s no surprise that for students and parents, choice of a college or even the discipline in India is primarily governed by the quality of placements. In the US and other developed countries, the role of career centres in universities is quite different from our training and placement cells. Career centres in these countries provide awareness about options, beef up resume writing skills, organise industrial meets and career fairs as well help with interview preparation. In India, while the good institutions do all of this, they also take on the responsibility of placing students in industries. Our institutions, therefore, vie with each other in improving their placement scenario and compete on the percentage of students placed. Even rankings in India use placements data for comparing institutions.